Just Another Day
by uturn
Summary: Short story, told from 'Mikes' POV...


My first try at anything like this. ' My O wn Private Idaho' is my favorite movie of all time and I'm so glad it has a section here. This short story is told from 'Mikes' point of view, I find 'Mike' the most wonderful character. enjoy.

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**Just Another Day**

Eyes open.

This gets more mechanical every time.

Now I stare to the left, it's what I do, habit.

Once I got hit, it was coming from the left so that's where I look.

Nothing.

Sometimes I wish to be hit again…. then there'd be something. Someone. Cars don't travel alone. Maybe there'd be some food?

Food.

The thought hovers there for a moment then evaporates, I can sense already that I'm miles from anywhere...or, miles from nowhere...whats the difference?

I collect myself, move a leg, shake out the knots the contractions left behind, I stick a numb hand to the floor, feel the gravel biting underneath and prying myself up off the tepid, harsh cement I stand.

Nothing.

Wait…..something. I see a figure walking towards me- whose out here? Bleak isn't the word, this place is fucking raw, dead, only the birds make noise as they travel somewhere else.

Its hazy in the distance, the heat floating on the air making shapes look like creatures and creatures seem like only shapes. I can make out hair, dark hair.

"Scott?"

I startle myself with my own sound, the figure comes closer.

"Scott!" - I yell in a rasping tone, more to myself I think, his name hang's in the air and I'm moving now, before I realise, stumbling slightly on my still-sleeping legs.

"What are you doing out here, where have you come from?"

I stop. Dead. The voice is a stranger's.

A lump rises in my throat and I feel an ache in my gut, an ache, disappointment. I open my mouth to speak, appriciating now what an effort it is to pull my cracked lips apart, he speaks again before I muster the words

"where's your car? How did you get out here?"

The black ensemble looks unsettlingly familiar, uniforms make me nervous. Always have. It's a built in fear I've never been able to and never been allowed to shake. He's chewing, loud, his mouth opening wide so I can see the gum clashing with his saliva with every crunch of his teeth. His hair is clinging to his sweating brow and edging onto oversized dark glasses, I quickly catch my reflection. Shit.

"Are you gonna answer me son, or do we have some kind of problem?"

I'm missing, take me home….that's how I feel, that's what i'd scream in his sweaty, bloated face if I knew he could do a damn thing about it.

I exhale loudly, I didnt mean too, just a sub-concious reaction to the thoughts- I'm honest with them, I reply, sometimes with words, sometimes gestures. They listen to me so I listen back.

"Am I boring you boy? do you speak?"- he sounds a little angered now, I nod my head slowly and catch my reflection in his Ray-Bans again.

I look a second longer this time, taking myself in, reminding myself of one of those feral children that were found in Europe, all wild hair and dark set crazed eyes, un-domesticated, abandoned.

My mind drifts back again to the offending road and the tower of a man in front of me. I become aware then, that I'm missing something. I look around quickly, side to side like a lost animal, I had a bag…its gone, so is my jacket. No point in checking for the cash, they'll have had that too. Fuckin' loosers. It's what I get for trickin unlighted highways at three in the morning. Gangbangs scare the shit outta me usually, but if they pay well...ha, fat lotta good that did me.

I hear a little laugh then, it takes me a moment to realise, it was me. Even though I can't see the officer's eyes, I can tell he is wearing a quirked expression, I smile inside as I wonder if the guy thinks I'm a little crazy, or loaded, or both...he wouldn't really be wrong either way.

"Last time son...what the hell' ya doin' out here?"

I'm too tired to lie, it'd come out wrong anyway, I've never been good at lying, especially to a uniform. So I tell the dude the truth…the half truth.

"hitchhiking huh?"

Yes sir.

"You know that's illegal in this state?"

Yes sir.

"What do you suppose we do about this here mess then?"

I don't know sir.

Then he tips the glasses, stares down over them and traces me from top to toe. He looks at me…in that strange way I've seen before. I try to stare back, attitude. Attitude I can't do, my stare turns into a glace as I look to either side and then to the cement below me.

A breeze.

I get a wiff of mint mixed with sweat and tobacco. I glance back up, he's still staring, only now with a wry, cat like smile, the type of smile that makes my flesh crawl and my stomach twist.

"You know…"

He strolls around me, now he is a cat, a wild cat circling pray.

"I've come across boys like you out here before…all alone, 'hitchhiking'. So that's all you were doing huh? 'hitchhiking'?..."

Sir….

"Goddammit, don't interrupt me boy!"

His face has flushed beacon red now, the sweat more profound, pouring down his forehead only to be halted by his overgrown eyebrows...

"Now, were you or were you not doing more out here than just plain hitch-hiking? Forgive me if I'm wrong, but seems to me that only a really stupid mother fuckin' hitchhiker would travel without a bag?"

Christ. I'm sweating now, I can feel the beads roll down from my temple, burning like acid.

"Now…"

That word, his last word, drags out into eternity. I know this. He chuckles, I breathe in hard, stand up straight and eye him now. I Know who he is, I've met him before, I've met lots of 'him' before.

"….. what I suggest we do is go back to my car and I'll help you get to where you wanna go…but, you'll have to do me a little favour in return for my humble generosity"

He nods my way, searching for recognition towards his proposal, I eye him again causiously. I see a flicker of nervousness and slight embarrassment in his eyes for just a second and try to hold him in it for as long as I can before caving and giving a nod back in his direction. A slight smile touches his lips.

His hand comes towards me then, fingers through my hair.

Down.

The tips grazing the side of my face.

Down.

Over my vest.

Down.

Onto my belt.

Down.

I feel his hand cup my crotch and squeeze, a hard squeeze. I can feel the hair stand to attention on the back of my neck, whilst maintaining the urge in my lap not to do the same.

Confusion then, the type of uncomfortable confusion where the desperate need to do something that helps you out is the last thing in the world you want to do at that moment in time.

It comes.

Clouds fall over my view, dropping in like old friends, my fingers start to spasm, my head tries to command them to stop but they're in charge now, I feel the all too familiar vibrations echoing through my being…. and he melts away.

Only muffled sounds now, could be crying, could be shouting, could be him…or is it me?...

Nothing.

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So, tell me what you think...constructive critisim welcome.


End file.
